121–130 of 230 posts
I wonder if she can have her name legally changed prior to picking up the ticket, and then changed back afterwards. I'm not sure if the signature on the back matters in that case.
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Because if people are suspicious they stop buying tickets.
Good, a tax on the uneducated, desperate, and mathematically illiterate is cruel and morally reprehensible to begin with. Propping it all up with publicity generated at the direct expense of the winners is pathetic.
Or do we now need an IQ test before certain types of activities can be enjoyed?
Related: I wonder if any analysis on the life outcomes of another jackpot system, "sold company for a windfall", have been done. I appreciate the bad lotto result stories because they confirm my correct bias that lotto should not be played because it is a tax on not understanding probability (except at about 350M for powerball, in which case your enemy is not expected value but variance). However, no such analysis se…
Each lottery ticket purchased is a no-skill crapshoot. People who are attracted to it tend to be looking for short cuts in life, not rolling up their sleeves for the hard and uncomfortable work of entrepreneurship. And unlike a startup, the lotto confers no personal benefits along the journey even when it fails.
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So moral of the story is to never sign your ticket. Looks like some lucky person was smart enough to do that. "In 2016, the last winner of the Powerball followed that advice. The $487 million prize claimed through the Robin Egg 2016 Nominee Trust, which was created by Shaheen, and he serves as its trustee."
> So moral of the story is to never sign your ticket. But doesn't this mean if someone can assault you and steal the ticket they can claim it themselves? Sounds like both have risks :/
I hope she wins. There's a pretty funny (or sad, I suppose) reddit comment about winning the lottery that seems pretty true: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/24vzgl/you_just_... Winning the lottery (publicly, at least) seems to be a real monkey's paw wish.
> I hope she wins I'm not sure I do. She opted into a transparent system and gets the down side that comes with it (or opts out). If this was thrust upon her, I might feel different. I fear the precedent this would set for redacting names from Forbes lists and the like. It's one of those unfortunate occurrences where openness and privacy are in conflict and when it's government actions like this, arresting someone, a…
Are you siding with the state on this merely because it's a state? Would you feel the same way if it were microsoft?
Related: I wonder if any analysis on the life outcomes of another jackpot system, "sold company for a windfall", have been done. I appreciate the bad lotto result stories because they confirm my correct bias that lotto should not be played because it is a tax on not understanding probability (except at about 350M for powerball, in which case your enemy is not expected value but variance). However, no such analysis se…
As somebody who lived as a professional gambler for a while, I would agree that your assessment of value of most lotteries is correct: they are poor value and should be avoided. However, we're not expecting people to deploy Kelly criterion here, nobody is playing lotto for EV and a need to maximise returns on known value parameters. But I play lotto. And I know all this more than most. I have literally paid my rent w…
and when it isn't a tiny part?
> Optimising your bank at that level is like trying to make sure you don't leave a single grain of rice on your plate at dinner.
many individuals playing the lottery are in a position like that, and frequently spend significantly more than $2 in hopes of winning.
> See the bigger picture from time to time.
...seriously? nobody cares if people like you or me burn a few dollars on a month on a lottery. the concern is for folks not in a position to do so.
I honestly don't see the issue. The only reason the lotto works is because people know you can win and it's not rigged, and the only way you can know that is by making the winners public. Finally, the only reason said lottery was $XXXM is because of the people who tried and failed, funding it. I doubt lotteries would pay such large amounts long term if anonymous lotteries were standard as fraud is inevitable. Being a…
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I don’t see the value in sticking to this legal technicality. She could have accepted the ticket using an anonymous trust, but since she signed it with her own name instead, she’s not allowed to change it. Since anonymous trusts are already legal there, there’s no threat of “losing openness.” I mean come on, that’s such a petty technicality for such a massive life event. Just let her set up the anonymous trust and mo…
The problem is allowing people to challenge the process, ex post facto, by which a winner is established. You can't think of any reason why making it easier to challenge that process--to change the outcome--might be problematic for an agency tasked with giving away hundreds of millions of dollars? Finality is one of the primary functions of rules and laws--of justice--often more important than getting a "correct" out…
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I really disagree with the common advice to take the lump sum - unless the winner is elderly. It seems to be centered on the idea that you can earn more interest/dividends yourself, but there are a few problems with that. 1. To get higher rates of return, you expose yourself to more risk of losses. The risk is real, i.e., you could lose everything. 2. You need even better (riskier) returns to pay for all the legal/in…
You are ignoring political risk eg in 15 years that state government changes the rules and sequesters the money - this actually happened in the UK to the SERP pension I lost mine for a small uplift in the state pension when they changed the rules. You also ignoring the time value of money 100 million to day is worth more than 10 million for 10 years
[0] http://money.cnn.com/2017/06/27/news/illinois-lottery-state-...
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The question is whether the law establishing the lottery permits that, and if so what clear limits the court can put into place so that the agency operating the lottery doesn't have to contend with too many complex scenarios that could ultimately result. Money attracts litigation, especially when the rules aren't crystal clear. It sucks for this woman, but technically she could always forgo the winnings altogether. N…
> The question is whether the law establishing the lottery permits that But that’s shouldn’t be the question. The question should be whether that law is extremely dumb (obviously it is), and whether it threatens to place undeserved stress on an individual going through a major life event (it does).